Drabbles
by AnnaCromwell
Summary: Just a collection of drabbles about Artemis and the gang.
1. Three Advices

After the war, everyone had told him to take a break, to explore and do something new, even when he was always doing something new.

"You need to go and mingle with the others," his parents had said.

"You need a girl in your life," Holly and Juliet added.

"If you don't know what's out there, you would never know about other, better things," Butler chimed in.

So he listened to all of them, and did the things they wanted.

He went and mingled with the others and got to know them; they weren't better than the people he knew. Save one.

One was a boy his age, fun and an extrovert, with boundless energy in him. A male version of Holly. The result of the first advice was a good one.

He followed the second advice and got a girl in his life - Minerva Paradizo. But she just wasn't what he wanted.

She was needy, always wanting to be with him. She never let him do anything without her. All their evenings were spent at lavish restaurants, or a home doing things a couple was supposed to do. She tried to, but never understood him. And when they went out for a get-together, her roving eye never stopped roving.

So he ended it. the second advice didn't yield any good results. Not yet.

So he followed the third, and found more than he had hoped for. A girl, quiet, fun in her own way and an introvert. A female version of him. Someone he could talk to all night, voicing his opinions, never bored of her company, and vice versa. She considered him her best friend, through that was less than what he could say of her. She was something else altogether for him, someone else. He just didn't know how to put it. But he wasn't in a hurry.

The third advice had yielded excellent results.


	2. Love And Opportunity

The perfect girl was supposed to be the one who did everything with you, treated you to be someone extra-special, who would sit up nights just to talk to you and in short, would do and be everything you wanted. Artemis' definition differed.

A recluse, silent, preferring to stay behind the scenes, she wasn't someone you would notice at first, unless you happened to cross her while she was in a group, or in a discussion on any scientific, political or literary topic. Then she was the center of attention.

The first time Artemis met her, she came across to be occupying his favorite seat in class - the last seat. Her demeanor was fire and ice at the same moment - she was icy and cold in behavior, and yet radiated a warmth, whose prime source seemed to be her eyes.

At first they barely spoke, occasionally exchanging answers to questions found in college-level books. The conversation then moved on to interests - they exchanged thoughts and opinions, then personal experiences, transcending to more intimate topics touched by friends. The friendship moved to a level where Artemis' girlfriend found it inconvenient for him to seen with his best friend.

Of course, his best friend didn't even know his girlfriend existed. Not as his girlfriend. And he wasn't happy being with her.

He decided to give them another shot - she came to his residence to talk it through. Artemis knew already it wouldn't end well.

Their proximity allowed his best friend's entry unnoticed to him, and she was in his study, going through a stack of stories by him when she thought of offering an opinion, and received heartbreak instead. Artemis stood with his girlfriend, her arms around him.

And that broke her heart, even though she didn't show it. She thought she hadn't.

Artemis noticed the sad smile, the stray tear, the clenched fists, but didn't know it would be this way. He thought he would be the one. Telling the young lady embracing him that it was over, and nothing would change it, he headed to the back-garden, a haunt he preferred when too upset. He wanted to break down, to yell and declare all those events as lies, a false image. He wanted to erase them from history.

He noticed the crying figure, and walked up to it, hoping that his actions could erase the previous. "You shouldn't be here," she said, not even bothering to wipe her tears, and told him a lie about them. He didn't like liars, despite being one. She gave up, only crying, saying she wasn't perfect. But then, his definition differed.

The only response he could manage would be inadequate, so he decided to go off his path and do something unexpected. Lifting her chin up with a finger, her stinging eyes closed, leaned in closer and kissed someone for the first time, pouring all his emotions into it. He thought he saw a figure see them and leave, but it didn't matter. He was where he belonged, and didn't care what anyone thought.

Love and opportunity knock only once.


	3. A Cut Above The Rest

Holly Short was the only child of the family, with a mother whose temperament was best compared to a raging fireball. Holly had definitely inherited that from her, and she wasn't going to let this defining trait lessen, much less disappear.

A first in many things, Holly wasn't the first tomboy. But she was the first to keep that about her well into her youth, when most teenage elves were concerned about the latest model of fairy cosmetics and the latest movie premiers.

She was concerned about wing models, about Neutrino Blasters, about pod docking. In the Academy, she proved that a girl could easily beat those elves straight out of street crunch-ball and into the Academy. She could fly a pod between the gap of your teeth, be calm and collected during a stakeout or an ambush, and also be the first dunker of the LEP crunch-ball team. All while still being pretty, and still being a raging fireball.

Many argued against her appointment in the LEPRecon. Why should she be here?

She was a cut above the rest, that's why.

* * *

Opal was a pixie who loved hard drives as much as she loved truffles and cosmetics. She was the delight of her family till the time she had built a circuit. Then, she was a pixie to be tamed. Pretty easy, her father thought. She was going to make sure he was wrong, and paid for thinking this all through his life.

Her success at the University proved she wasn't just as good, she was better than the others. And being a girl who looked capable of only being a trophy wife. She was going to maintain the looks, but not the image.

She would crush it with her tiny fists.

And when she had done that, the world was falling at her feet. Why shouldn't they?

After all, she was a cut above the rest.

* * *

Minerva may look like a pretty damsel with her corkscrew curls, petite body and winning smile. But hidden behind that smile was a girl with burning determination, someone who, if angered, could raze you to the ground and leave nothing behind.

Forever treated like a princess, she took advantage of her situation, twisting it to suit her needs of a teen genius. Every boy who set eyes on her would smile sweetly, or smirk, which she would return with a neat retort. After she was termed a brainless bitch, she made sure the 'brainless' would be permanently removed from her name. The other part, she didn't care. If she could break hearts, morale and egos while making a point, then all the better. After all, no one took girl seriously until they did something serious.

She was the badass bitch, not the brainless one. And she was happy being that way. If it meant her success and survival, she was okay being the 'bitch'. It would keep the other bimbos at bay anyway, and make the boys see her as a force to reckon, not to mention a girl to fall badly for. Beauty and brains, are, after all, a lethal combination. She was in that league.

And even in that league, she was a cut above the rest.


End file.
